Technology has opened up many solutions and tools that allow the average to dabble in easy online graphic editors. Many would agree there is one online design tool that is increasingly more popular than the rest – Canva. And with multiple Canva alternatives, creating beautiful designs is not just for the professionals.
According to Adobe research, 59% of global consumers prefer beautiful design over the simple elementary design before they choose to engage with a brand. This has driven up the demand for graphic design cloud-based software and the need to have it readily available. That's why Adobe offers Adobe Spark which is one of the easiest to use editors.
Canva’s graphic design platform has revolutionized how we create various types of creative content, such as social media images, infographics, shirt design templates, media images, and more. Canva Pro also now comes with a 30-day free trial here. Canva’s mobile app for iPhone, iPad, and mobile phones with Android are also available for download via the Apple Store and Google Play, letting users create free artwork even without access to their computers. Canva also has really good Canva Templates and a free plan to start designing. The stock photos if you use Canva pretty good and integrate well into their pro plan and other features. You can recognize a Canva Design pretty easily if you make graphics for a living. The full details on the service are in our Canva review.
You don’t even need to be an expert or study graphic design to get stunning results. Many graphic professionals, business owners, freelancers, and entrepreneurs are raving about this graphic tool including Candy Bigwood, Mobile Art Director at The Huffington Post. Giving a user’s perspective, she said, “There are no design skills required or costly program downloads that have to go through approvals. Results are instantaneous.”
However, Canva has a number of limitations that tend to be an issue for some of its users. Image editing options are still limited compared to other editors. Its resize feature is only available for premium users and if you want to use some of the better-looking images in their library, you have to pay for them.
So if you are a fan of this free image creator, but are looking for websites like Canva online with better or comparable features, Stock Photo Secrets have compiled 18 of the top graphic design websites Canva alternatives and apps like Canva.
19 of the Top Graphic Design Alternatives to Canva:
Here is our list of tools like Canva and other Graphic Editors and Photo Editing Tools if you are on a small marketing budget. Some of these are more social media tools where others are more design maker. Most of them have an image library included and replace Photoshop for basic edits without ever visiting a design school.
Use any of these tools with the help of our 102 tips to creating visual content without the aid of a graphic designer!
Adobe Spark (20% Off) (recommended)
- Over 25K templates
Choose from the trendiest premium templates - Free images and icons
Access millions of free images, icons, and GIFs - Adobe Fonts
Get the complete library of beautiful Adobe Fonts - What watermark?
Remove the Adobe Spark watermark – forever - One-tap personalization
Apply your logo, colors, and fonts in one magical tap - Brandify
Create from branded templates and themes - Collaboration
Teamwork makes the dream work – invite others to collaborate - Multiple brands
Easily switch between brands while editing projects to boost your productivity
Available on the web or on mobile, this platform offers three mobile apps: Spark Post for creating social images, Spark Page for designing web pages, and Spark Video for creating short videos in minutes. These mobile apps are available on Google Play and Apple Store. Adobe Spark offers a free plan that allows you to use some free templates.
Want an in-depth look at this tool? Check out our Adobe Spark review!
Fotor
There are also thousands of professionally-designed templates and canvas design available ideal for various social media channels, like Instagram posts, Facebook covers, Youtube banners, and more. For creating designs on the go, Fotor’s mobile graphics design app is also available for download on the Apple Store and Google Play.
Ideal for: photographers who need to do some photo editing, this online design tool features HDR photography technology and photo retouching kit.
back to menu ↑RelayThat
You can also work with their concierge team to import brand assets and send messages through a custom portal. Using RelayThat’s smart layouts, you can create different designs that stick to your brand and are optimized to suit various channels.
Ideal for: startup businesses and small business owners who don’t have graphic designers in-house to help with their projects.
back to menu ↑Easel.ly
This tool is perfect for agencies who regularly create reports for their clients. It offers a wide selection of pre-made templates for creating infographics for timelines, processes, resumes, comparisons, reports, and more. Easelly has a free version with a few basic features.
Ideal for: creating reports, presentations, resumes, or even as an image for your blogs, this graphic design software will make it easy for you to capture your audience’s attention.
back to menu ↑Visme
Visme
Ideal for: SMBs and startups who are pitching new projects.
back to menu ↑BeFunky
Its suite of powerful graphic design tools includes loads of customizable design templates, over a million free stock images, and thousands of icons and vector graphics. The BeFunky mobile app also provides a selection of editing tools such as photo effects and collage templates. Available for both iOS and Android mobile users.
Ideal for: amateur photographers who need to edit their photos.
back to menu ↑Pixlr
Pixlr
You can easily crop or resize photos and even remove the background easily. Pixlr is available both on the web or mobile, with the mobile app available for download via Google Play and Apple Store.
Ideal for: pro and amateur photographers who need to add a bit of TLC to their photos.
back to menu ↑Infogram
They also provide custom templates to help brands stick to their design guidelines that meet the (brand) colors, fonts, and logos defined for a specific brand. Object animations, interactive charts, and maps will help you create better visual content that your audience will admire.
With Infogram, you can also collaborate with your team and view or restore previous versions without the stress. And if you want to keep track of the performance of your content, Infogram will make that easy for you with its analytics feature. Also, Infogram offers a free plan with some 37+ interactive charts types among other things.
Ideal for: must-have for startups and digital marketers who are promoting blog content online.
back to menu ↑FotoJet
This simple photo editor also lets you add text or effects to photos, as well as crop, resize, and enhance images for a more artistic image that is worth sharing with the world. Also, FotoJet has a free basic version with features such as editing tools, fonts, photo effects among others.
Ideal for: Fotojet is perfect for amateur graphic designers who need a helping hand.
back to menu ↑Pablo by Buffer
Pablo
Its simple editing interface is very easy to use but only offers limited options in terms of effects, formats, and fonts and font sizes and colors. This gives its users fewer choices to concern themselves and therefore spend less time creating social media graphics.
Ideal for: a fan favorite with startups, this tool is great for teams who have limited graphic design resources.
back to menu ↑Easil
These high-quality templates can be resized to suit your needs. Its text effect tools allow you to be more creative with text to help make your images pop! Easil Plus Plan lets you save custom color palettes, logos, fonts, and images with Brand Kit.
Brand Kit also provides users with the opportunity to create exclusive brand templates that can be shared with your team.
Ideal for: Perfect for digital marketers and social web marketing teams who collaborate.
back to menu ↑Stencil
This platform will let you upload your own fonts and logos to give you more opportunities to personalize your designs. If you want to create quotes to share online, you can browse through more 100,000 quotes in Stencil’s library.
Improve your images using image filters, resize them instantly, share directly to Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest, or schedule your posts via Buffer. This free image creator is fast and easy to use and can also be used as a Chrome or Safari extension and a Firefox Add-on.
Ideal for: a must-have for digital marketing and social media agencies who are creating and posting social media content on behalf of their clients. Stencil is an important player.
back to menu ↑Snappa
You have free access to more than 1 million stock images, 200+ fonts, and more than 100,000 vectors and shapes available in Snappa’s library to create beautiful images. With Snappa’s preset dimensions and thousands of pre-made templates, you can easily create impactful posts images that are sure to gain your audience’s attention.
Ideal for: Another awesome tool for amateur graphic designers and social media marketers, especially in SMBs and startups.
back to menu ↑DesignBold
You are free to use DesignBold’s growing resources including millions of images, hundreds of fonts, a vast collection of layouts, and more than 50 document formats. This platform also makes it easy for users to save designs to Dropbox.
Ideal for: graphic designers of all skill levels.
back to menu ↑PiktoChart
With more than 800 templates to choose from, you can easily create infographics, presentations, posters, and flyers for different purposes. You can add images, animated icons, interactive charts, and videos for more eye-catching designs that you can simply print or directly share online.
Ideal for: A perfect solution for graphic design teams with limited resources.
back to menu ↑Desygner
You can simply change images, fonts, colors, and texts, as well as work with layers, effects, and multiple-page files. With millions of images, thousands of icons and shapes, and hundreds of pre-made banners and fonts, all royalty-free, you won’t have to worry about finding the right elements for your designs.
Once your design is ready, you can share it via email and various social media platforms, use it for your presentation, or download a high-resolution copy of the design for printing.
Ideal for: amateur graphic designers who have limited resources
back to menu ↑Placeit
Apart from having the biggest library of mockups online, they also provide users with an easy-to-use, drag-and-drop platform for creating beautiful designs for all sorts of prints and posts.
Placeit also provides flexible templates for video slideshows, ads, and social media posts to help you create unique visual content for sharing and printing. Looking for the perfect logo for your brand? Placeit can help you with that! With thousands of options available, and more designs being added each week, you are sure to find the logo that is right for your business.
Ideal for: eCommerce brands that sell creative designs or personalized prints.
back to menu ↑PixTeller
You can easily create images with different gradients and transparent backgrounds, create quick animations using the PixTeller Animation Timeline, or even automatically create images and video layouts through PixBot.
Ideal for: This is a perfect solution for social media marketers that want to spice up their social media posts.
back to menu ↑BONUS: TailorBrands
TailorBrands solves the issues of long turnarounds and costly designer honoraries while giving you a personalized logo good to use anywhere in your business, plus extra marketing and branding materials. The best of all is it doesn't require any design skills whatsoever, all you have to do is enter your ideas and preferences and the system does the rest!
This is a paid service, with three available pricing tiers (monthly or annual memberships), but now you can get it with 40% off using our exclusive TailorBrands coupon!
Ideal for: It's the ultimate solution to get an original company logo and branding materials fast and without spending much.
Canva Alternative Conclusion
In conclusion, no matter what your purpose is in creating graphic designs, there is more than one way for you to achieve the design goals that you have in mind. With the design sites like Canva listed above, you will soon find the perfect online design tool that suits your needs and preferences. We recommend t check if you want to pay per month or per export. You should also know if you need stock photos included or if you are willing to pay peruse.
If you’re not sure where to start here are some of our go-to best Canva alternatives: Adobe Spark is the perfect solution for anyone who loves Adobe's editing tools and has the power to make amateur work look professional. Fotor has a user-friendly platform with lots of helpful tutorial videos. Relaythat is great for teams that need to collaborate either internally or with their clients.
Looking for images to use in Canva projects or alternative sites, use our discount codes to get massive reductions in your stock photo purchases from world-class stock agencies.
And as we said at the beginning, now you can test Canva Pro for 30 days for free.
Maybe we missed one of your favorite tools? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
Amos Struck
I am a publisher and entrepreneur in the stock imagery field. I focus on providing knowledge and solutions for buyers, contributors and agencies, aiming at contributing to the growth and development of the industry. I am the founder and editor of Stock Photo Press, one of the largest networks of online magazines in the industry. I am the founder of Microstock Expo, the only conference dedicated to the microstock segment. I created several software solutions in stock photography like WordPress plugins. Plus I am a recurrent speaker at Photokina Official Stage, and an industry consultant at StockPhotoInsight. I am passionate about technology, marketing and visual imagery.
Uhhh PixTeller is the best when it comes to make my animations. Thank you Amos for sharing this list
Than you Alecu – glad we could be helpful.